Whatever Gods May Be
by SofterSoftest
Summary: Six months after Violet Baudelaire dies, she shows up in his apartment.
1. ONE

" _From too much love of living,_

 _From hope and fear set free,_

 _We thank with brief thanksgiving_

 _Whatever gods may be_

 _That no life lives for ever;_

 _That dead men rise up never;_

 _That even the weariest river_

 _Winds somewhere safe to sea."_

-AC Swinburne, _The Garden of Proserpine_

* * *

ONE

Six months after Violet Baudelaire dies, she shows up in his apartment.

It's a normal night. Fuzzy around the edges from far too much wine, the whole apartment grungy and catastrophic looking. The yellowed bulb illuminating his living room flickers like an old reel of film, a crazed spasm of light. It reminds Olaf of the pain in his temples, a constant high jab of headache that throbs behind his eyes, makes even his teeth ache.

Between the headache, the light, and the setting sun, the shadows keep changing.

He's plenty disoriented, stumbling, dropping records to the floor when he means to flip them, forgetting to guide the needle to its groove and only remembering once the silence feels too heavy.

There's a sour smell to the air.

Not one that comes from the carpet or the dishes or the alley out his open window. A rot, like mold. A fungal bloom. Some black disaster, growing in the walls.

Olaf pushes the realization away, uncaring. He has not noticed the smell in the handful of months that he has inhabited this grungy apartment, yet he's hardly been reliably aware. It was enough to get inside, get hidden, get himself used to his refined, bitter victory. He'll adapt to the smell, to the heavy drag of it in his lungs.

Easier than doing the dishes, he thinks. Or shutting the window.

He picks a record from the stack without looking at it, drops the needle more flippantly than he intends. It jerks, a fine-tipped scratch of noise, and then the music begins. It's swoopy, whining, dramatic, and not at all what he wants. Olaf makes a disgusted, annoyed grunt in the flickering light and lurches away, yanking the closest open wine bottle off the coffee table and chugging it. Only after the first few swigs does he realize its gone bad - too bitter, and rotten like the scent in the walls. Drunk as he is, though, his lips have gone numb, his tongue dull. He drains the whole bottle, watches the wine fade until he can see the deep green of the bottle bottom.

Behind him, the beat picks up. He drops the bottle to the floor, not hard enough to break. The song, not being his usual bop of bright noise - he prefers it jazzy and obnoxious - annoys him more than it should. He spins on his heel too quickly, (a dizzying jerk of color and noise, his whole body numb and vague as vapor at the edges - ) so he has to catch himself against the little metal cabinet his record player rests atop. The needle skips again. The song changes and it's not any better.

Out of the corner of his eye, the single bulb flickers out, blinks back too bright. He yanks the record from its track, fumbles for the sleeve. The silence is stark, immediate, as expansive as snowfall. Even the wind seems softer, lesser, though he hardly notices.

Later, he will think it is only due to this silence that he first notices her.

There's a choking noise, feminine, high, a brittle squeak of terror.

Olaf whirls in an instant, scrabbling for the pocket of his trousers. His switchblade is in his hand before his vision adjusts.

Outside, bleeding in, the light is so blue (the color, he thinks, of a cartoonish corpse - ) she almost looks alive. The fizzing light passes through her, out of her. Doesn't catch in the shine of her hair or the dip of her collarbones. She stands behind his couch, grabbing at her clothes - pajamas, white with red pinstripes, an embroidered heart at the breast pocket - as if she had never seen them. Her small hands fist at her stomach, catching in the buttons. Another choking noise from her, head tucked down as she examines her body. Frantic little hands. Whining like an animal.

"How'd you get in here?" Olaf demands, slurring.

Now that he can see her alone, he's hardly startled, only wondering if he can charm her into staying. She's slight beneath those pajamas, small enough to throw around. He has an immediate intrusive thought - swinging her over his shoulder, a giggle he has never heard, dumping her onto his mattress. Though his switchblade is still ready and willing in his hand. It catches the flickering bulb, gleams, another restless tic of light to warp his vision.

At his voice, her head snaps up.

There's a raw horror to her eyes that makes him uneasy.

She's far too pale. Even stuck staring at him, her mouth hanging open, her eyes desperate, denying, he recognizes her instantly.

Olaf's gut heaves, a sick lurch that has nothing to do with alcohol.

Last time he'd seen her, he had been hurrying through the Baudelaire mansion, the smell of smoke at his back, spotting her in a disgustingly cheerful family portrait, stunned into suspension despite his pursuit, saying to himself as if addressing a friend, " _She's a pretty one."_

And she was. With her two young siblings before her, her father at her back steady as a shadow, her mother leaning to bump their foreheads affectionately together (unified and sickening and, he thinks, a _lie_ \- ) Violet looked exactly like her mother as a young adult only softer, more feminine, a kinder ease to her eyes. Though, for all their similarities, he had never been struck by Beatrice in this exact way. All her talent and ruthlessness (and blatant, merciless independence - ) had made her an opponent more than a conquest worth attempting. The contrast between Beatrice and her daughter, even in that one picture, had been enough to make him grin, thinking - _does all that purity feel like an insult?_

And still. Even in death, even pale as the rising moon, Violet Baudelaire was unfathomable and lovely.

Disgusted, flat, he says like an accusation, "Baudelaire."

That sparks some awareness in Violet. She turns, glancing around his dirty apartment. There's no sound to it. No subtle press of her feet to the floor, no breath, no rustle of clothes. Her voice is shrill, sounds shattered and gravelly, as if shot through with static.

"Father?" She warbles. Those little hands still tugging at her clothes. "Father?"

"He's not here." Olaf spits. "You're dead."

He only truly realizes it once he's said it, each small observation falling into place and presenting an impossible conclusion. Olaf is sure that somewhere in his piles of mess he still has that edition of the _Punctilio -_ BAUDELAIRE MANSION BURNT TO THE GROUND, FAMILY LOSES ELDEST DAUGHTER TO THE FLAMES. He had stared at the monochrome pictures enough to see them perfectly when his eyes closed. The skeletal, charred remains of the home and Violet printed next to them, a headshot, a candid caught mid-laugh, charming and innocent and utterly worth missing.

"You're dead," he repeats. "So what are you doing here?"

Violet's eyes find his. The utmost revulsion and horror (and something jagged with cruelty, a decimating spark of recognition - ) in them makes him grin.

"You're - " She says with a repressed, furious bite. "You. _Did this_ to me."

She cannot even say it.

 _You hurt me_ , Violet doesn't say, though he can hear it clear and true as if she had. _You killed me dead._

His grin grows wider. "Hi, Violet. Nice to see you again."

The look on her face is stunned, still, feral. She starts blinking like she's going to cry, or would, if she was able. Olaf leans back against the wall and watches her suffer, delighted with himself, entertained beyond words.

Violet shakes her head, glaring at him beneath the stark cut of her bangs, a snarl to her pretty little mouth. She closes her eyes on a wince, as if cut up by the rage in her, takes a breath, starts to speak. "You _left me_ there - "

Olaf blinks and she's gone.

The swamping silence returns.

The light bulb flickers.

His switchblade is folded like a closed book, like a shutting door, like the lid to a casket stuffed tight with flowers.

He returns to his music triumphant and smiling.


	2. TWO

He tells himself he dreamt her.

That the misty presence of Violet Baudelaire scowling in pinstripe pajamas, so furious she could barely speak, was the consequence of too much wine, too little company, and too many days spent indoors.

Although he watches his back the whole time, wears large sunglasses and a scarf despite the pleasant near-summer weather, Olaf manages to leave his apartment eventually. Only for a few hours, and never once does he speak to anyone, yet internally he writhes with shame and fury and, only once he thinks of the burning mansion, the smoking ash, the body of a girl stuck deep in the ground, does he allow himself bitter pride.

A victory, he thinks, even if he's reduced to restless caution. His charisma stunted, his backbone bent, his nose to the ground, he is still the winner, still the one who lit the match to strike the curtains to char the Baudelaire home. And their eldest. He finds some glee in that.

Though he finds merciless happiness in Violet Baudelaire's death, and denies as best he can her own apparition, it does not stop the sudden swamp of nightmares.

A dirty mattress, dragged up the stairs from behind a nearby dumpster, serves as his bed. It lies crooked across the floor of his bedroom. Fills the space with a musty smell. He makes sure to close his eyes before he touches it, as if enduring an encounter with an unlovely lover, so he does not have to look at the stains, the wear, the grime. Alone, it's enough to give him nightmares, yet he usually sleeps with instant, heavy intensity, as if he has never regretted a single thing in his life.

The nightmares show up as sudden and uninvited as she had, on the very same night.

He dreams of himself standing in his little bathroom, looking into the mirror, and his reflection suddenly grinning too wide and too quickly, a stranger, someone in possession of his body with no say at all from him. His reflection reaches up slowly, then out, towards him, as if to say - _This is mine now, mine, and you can't do anything at all -_

In many nightmares, he's the wretched star. A long iron rod is stuck at a downward angle through his forehead and he has to pull it out himself, one hand over the other, feeling it slide behind his teeth, up through the roof of his mouth, past his sinuses, dragging, catching, his mouth filling with blood.

In another, he loses his teeth. Some nights he's poisoned. Or drowning. Or lying face-up in the gut of a dumpster.

Always, though, he is being followed. He is ignoring his reflection to a pounding at the door, he is swinging that rod once he has it free (slick and slippery in his hands - ) he is stuffing his own teeth into his pockets as he flees.

It's Bertrand who runs him down. Always Bertrand and never Beatrice and he doesn't quite know why. ( _Father_? Violet had warbled in panic, her very first word. _Father?_ ) Catching up, coming closer, Bertrand trails him like smoke.

Olaf never sleeps long enough to look the man in the eyes.

Most nights he dreams of Violet.

Dreams of her floating in his apartment, spitting maggots. Dreams of only black smoke and the sound of her coughing. Dreams of her portrait from the _Punctilio_ , pointing at him, laughing so hard she can barely breathe, forcing - _You did this to me! You did this to me!_

He tells himself he dreamt her.

Yet he doesn't quite believe it.

Olaf senses her before he turns his key. It's a static to the air, a heaviness, like the feeling of eyes on his skin though no one is around. He debates turning back yet there are several bottles of wine in his grasp that need opening and there is no way he's going to be forced from his apartment by the ghost of a girl he has already killed.

He wishes he was drunker, that fine blur of intoxication having dimmed his last several days fading only now. Although he knows he's not, he feels very sober finally turning his key.

She's floating above the couch when he opens the door. Curled foetal, her head on her knees, her back to him. The red pinstripes of her pajamas barely visible in the afternoon sun.

Olaf scowls at her even though she cannot see, shuts the door too hard, keys jangling. He sets his collection of wine on the cluttered coffee table. When he glances at her again, she's facing him, still curled in on herself, those wide eyes watching him.

"Welcome back, little sprite." He says through a sneer, all faux-charm. "I didn't think you'd return after fleeing last time."

"I didn't flee. I can't control it." Violet says softly. There's none of that past fury in her voice, only the weary calm of fact. "I didn't mean to leave, just like I didn't mean to appear. I've tried to go. Through your door or the open window. But I can't."

Olaf grabs a bottle from the table, a bitter red, and drops onto the couch. He tugs the knife from his pocket, clicks the blade free, and tucks it under the metal foil coating the cork until it splits. The foil drifts to the floor. He lets his knife rest in his lap as he jerks at the top with his teeth.

"Too bad." He says, once he's spat out the cork. "I have no need for a ghost, no matter how pretty. Can't you go haunt your wretched family?"

"I can't do that either." Violet says as he takes several gulps straight from the bottle. The alcohol hits him like a breath of fresh air, a beloved crutch, an instant shot of glee. "I've only shown up here so far."

Olaf settles his shoulders against the arm rest, stretches his long legs across the cushions. Violet hovers like a cloud, just as pale, a foot above the backrest, watching him. Despite the nightmares and the deep horror her existence summons, Olaf finds himself suddenly grateful for her company, if only to give him an excuse to hear his own voice.

"Then where do you go?" He demands. "When you're not here."

Violet scowls at him like he's playing a joke. A hint of that aggression returns to her voice. Just as demanding, she asks, "What do you mean?"

He takes several more swigs of wine before answering, just to let her suffer. "It's been two weeks. Since you showed up."

A fine flick of horror crosses Violet's face, distracts her attention. Her brows come together in an expression of grief and utmost confusion. Hush. Her worried eyes trace the floor, looking for a memory she cannot recall.

"You didn't know?" Olaf asks, unable to quell his grin. He twirls the bottle by the neck, watches the wine twist, before setting it atop the table and standing, his open blade clattering to the floor. Calculative, mystified, his eyes roam Violet's face which is still frozen in distress.

"You're Olaf, right?" She asks, voice quiet, eyes still vague and unsettled. "I remembered your face last time. Your voice. Not your name."

That makes him grin, as if someone had recognized him on the street for his creative endeavors. " _Count_ Olaf. Impresario. And you're Violet Baudelaire. Deceased!"

She doesn't respond to that. He takes another step towards her, reaching out. "Tell me, Violet, what's it like being a ghost?"

That breaks the shock in her. She drops her knees, jerks back through the air with fresh alarm and disgust on her face. Only once she is out of the sunlight does Olaf notice her pajama bottoms, singed black at the ends. This small detail erodes something in his chest, a vicious landslide caving at his center.

"Don't try to touch me again." Violet says, harsh. She's glaring at him. It's becoming a familiar expression now- fierce, hateful gaze, scrunched nose, a stern slant to that mouth.

Olaf snorts, rolls his eyes. "Or what, you'll hurt me? Haunt me? You're as frightening as curdled milk. Especially in those little heart pajamas."

"I died in this outfit!" Violet shouts. Offense and disgust ball her fists like she wants to strike him. "You killed me in these pajamas! You - _left me_ there!"

Again, though he doesn't like acknowledging it, there's a twinge of dread in him. Confronted with the end result of his actions, he feels small but sharp shame, like a splinter buried too deep to pick loose.

"No time to change clothes when your home is burning." Olaf says, unconcerned. He takes a gulp of the wine, looks her in the eyes, says, "Sleeping beauty Violet Baudelaire. At least you died peacefully. Thank me for that at least."

"You _would_ think that, wouldn't you? That I slept through everything. Even with my fever, the smoke woke me well before the fire. But I was too weak to do anything about it."

That twinge of dread sinks to his stomach, blooms like an ulcer. Olaf tries to remember that night, hunts in his mind for any scrap of her. There had only been the portrait, that photograph, to mesmerize him. Seduced, decimated, unhinged with one glance to her likeness.

If he had found her sick, in those dainty little pajamas, all alone, he thinks he might have stolen her away. Might have convinced her to undress for him, toyed with her addled mind, might have wiped the sweat from her brow, clenched his fist in the damp hair at the back of her neck, softly curling. He might have carried her in his arms down the staircase, (he has a sudden flash of a dream within a dream, an open door seen through an open door - pausing on the landing with Violet in his arms, making her kiss her own portrait as she would kiss him - ) her arms around his throat, making her watch as he struck the curtains.

He might have stolen her. Might have seduced her. Might have taken her and dropped her off miles away in the middle of nowhere, left a bitter, victorious letter for her mother in the breast pocket of her shirt, folded small behind that stitched heart.

There are many things he'd have liked to do with a young, pliant Violet Baudelaire. But he wouldn't have dreamed of killing her. At least not that night.

Olaf drains the rest of the bottle before he speaks. He's feeling comfortably blurry besides the ache in his gut - morality, he wonders, or lack of food? He cannot remember the last time he ate - and his twisted appreciation for Violet's company has started to sour. He can feel himself going soft with alcohol, a rare and rotten consequence.

"Fever?" He asks, instead of, " _Would you have let me touch you?"_

"I was sick." Violet says, still glaring, though her tone is softer. He wonders if he has surprised her. Wonders if she expected laughter or cruelty. They sit in his throat, ready weapons, yet they are wine-soaked and tired and that shred of shame, of missed opportunity, crawls in his gut and he bends to it without option. "Mother had tickets to the opera for months. We were all so excited to go. I'd been feverish for over a day by then but I didn't want them to miss it. I had just turned seventeen, after all. I could manage a cold on my own. But it… wasn't just a cold. My fever got worse after they left. I was so confused. Kept hearing things. Thought they'd come home over and over again but no one showed up to check on me. And the house was so still."

Her eyes find his. She's dropped the glare and all that's left is sprawling, endless grief. "And then you showed up."

Olaf turns so he does not have to look at her. He scrabbles for his switchblade on the floor, uses it to open his second bottle, something pink and too carbonated. This time he folds the weapon back into his pocket, takes a few loud sips through the fizz before collapsing back onto the couch.

There is one detail he shares before he can stop himself, something small and trivial as pocket change yet he is ashamed of it anyway, so sure that it lessens the victory somehow, even if the outcome is better than he had expected or even wanted. A bitter truth he had hoped to avoid. "I didn't know you were there. If that will stop your whining. _Left you there_. Brat. It wasn't about you."

He closes his eyes incase she floats into view, tired of staring at the cracks in his ceiling and the single bulb waiting for the sun to sink.

Her voice floats over instead, cool and soft as a breeze. "Would you have done it still? If you knew I was there?"

"Yes." Olaf responds instantly, lying. "And I would feel just as proud."

"I heard you downstairs." Violet says, a new hurt to her voice, something brutal and furious. "I thought you might have been my father. But you were talking to yourself that whole time, running around. I tried to call for you. For someone. But I was too dizzy and so tired. And then the smoke started."

She pauses, her throat closing with the memory. He's glad he's not looking at her. He's so drunk the room starts to twist beneath him, but it does little to distract from the prickle of discomfort over his skin as Violet continues speaking.

"I screamed and screamed. Saw the fire in the doorway. Felt the smoke in my mouth. It came closer and closer and I couldn't move. It was so loud. And then everything _hurt_ \- "

" _Stop_." Olaf spits. The shame in him has transformed into familiar anger and he welcomes the change, the front door of his heart wide open and inviting more. He wonders if he'll be forever cursed with flipping sentiment- feeling victory and pride over burning the Baudelaire mansion, over taking their eldest daughter from his most hated enemies, yet, when confronted with the (lovely, gossamer-fine - ) spectre of Violet, he hates himself utterly. "Stop it."

He rises, the whole room off kilter, slams the bottle down onto the coffee table too hard. It skews, tips and spills with a hiss, rolling off the table and onto the floor. Olaf watches it happen and doesn't feel a thing. When his eyes focus, he looks at Violet who watches him back with a hard expression of malice, disgust, and remembered fear.

"If you want me to beg forgiveness you'll be waiting till I'm as dead as you." Olaf spits, nasty and harsh and so alive with it his heart could burst. "I have no guilt. I'd do it all again. But if I could change one thing I'd have gone to your bedroom and touched you when I had the chance and _oh_ you'd have loved it. Imagine. Feverish young thing writhing in my arms. You'd be so out of it you'd hardly know I was real. Perhaps, Violet, it was a mercy I didn't know you were there. You're welcome."

"You're vile." Violet hisses, voice shaking, and only then, hurling insults at him, does she sound like her mother. "I hate you so much I can hardly stand it. Feel free to drink yourself to death. Seeing as I can't leave, I'll gladly watch."

He grins at that, endeared by her hatred. He watches her fuming for several moments, the wild, rapid scan of her eyes over him, her balled little fists. His eyes linger on the singed ends of her clothes. "I saw pictures of you. You didn't seem this angry when you were alive."

Something in that hurts Violet so deeply it kills her rage. Her jaw tightens and she glances away, head tucked down. All she gives him is, "I wasn't."

The hurt in her reminds him of her earlier horror, confronting the gaps between her waking moments. These periods of introspection make him uncomfortable. He prefers her loud and shouting, her hot eyes on him, all her attention his to wield.

"Thinking on it, drinking myself to sleep sounds like a perfect plan, Baudelaire. I'm going to get very naked and sprawl on my bed and think of fucking you in your burning home while I touch myself. You're invited to watch, of course. I'll keep the door cracked."

"Die." Violet snaps, and _there's_ that rage again, so hot and real he imagines he can feel it coming off her like heat.

It makes him snicker as he lurches to his feet, gathering the remaining bottles of wine in his arms, his fingers numb, his whole body foggy at the edges. He stumbles into his bedroom, dumps the bottles onto his mattress.

When he goes to crack the door, Violet's back is to him, her head down, and he knows he will see this when he closes his eyes, the strip of exposed skin at the back of her neck, pale as frost, while his own body (hot and aroused and very much alive - ) burns.


	3. THREE

He wakes in pain most days.

Subtle aching, barely there at first. Thinned out towards the edges of his body, dragging like shadow.

Olaf notices these aches distantly, like remnants of dreams, as he comes-to atop his rank and rotten mattress. Through squinting, he finds his bedroom undisturbed. Still barren, save for the bedding, the piles of clothes, the curtainless window blazing with sun. He heaves his waking sigh to tightness in his ribs, to discomfort. Throws a hand over his eyes, annoyed, cursing at the light, and the sudden shock of pain that spikes from wrist to elbow is enough to make him flinch. It comes later, in rising (body bending, bones cracking like stone - ) that he truly hurts.

Dread floods his body, always. Every morning.

His very first cognizant thought repeated like a ritual - _What has she done now?_

A quick stumble to his adjacent bathroom, a smack of the lightswitch, (gut already sinking with fury and ugly, needling humiliation - ) and he is standing before the mirror shirtless and gruesome. Light reveals fresh bruises like rapid gunfire across his ribs, collecting over his heart. Old bruises freckle his body elsewhere - his navel, his arms, the tops of his feet, each mark the color of eucalyptus wilting.

Although this has become agonizingly normal, his eyes snag on fresh damage. A new soreness blooms as he turns his head, breathes, flexes his jaw.

His reflection freezes in the lowlight.

Red welts lace his throat like hickeys. Like strangulation.

He imagines it on impulse: Violet floating into his bedroom once she hears him snoring. Examining the level of wine still in his hoard of bottles. Placing those little fingers on any stretch of his exposed skin and twisting until a welt rises hot between them. Using all her strength for a bruise the size of a dime.

" _You're lucky all I can do is pinch,"_ Violet had hissed when he first confronted her about his newfound contusions. " _You deserve worse."_

Olaf tilts his head, leans in closer to his mirror speckled with grime. The marks at his throat are longer, deeper in color, more force behind them than idle playground pinching.

Through the gutting swell of his outrage, he tries to recall any relevant sensation and comes up empty. Most nights, he falls into bed wine-drunk and numb. He is not too surprised he did not feel her. (Though he does enjoy the ending that undoubtedly followed. Himself snoring through her clenching fists at his throat, victorious even in sleep. Violet's frustration boiling, trying with all her pitiful might to snap his windpipe shut. Useless.)

Olaf stares at his body in the mirror. Wounded by the ghost of a young woman. He is a disgrace to himself.

This is what finally angers him. Tips past bitter amusement (" _You can barely touch me, kid. Keep it coming. One day you might even break the skin."_ ) and into kerosene, heat and spark and flame. Rage.

(Olaf always knows the best way to start a fire. Give him chemicals. Give him matches. Give him flint and stone. Give him anything at all and he will find a way to tempt the latent destruction. Headquarters to a secret organization. A beloved family home. He can do it. Give him a moment. Step back. Watch.)

In the mirror, his mottled chest heaves. His aching throat constricts. It is this violation that sends him snarling into the front room.

Violet hovers by the window. Hanging like a noose in the air, like a death omen. She has not left for three weeks.

Most times they do not speak, and Olaf is not bothered by her. He can look at her more readily when she's silent, appreciate her like a spectacle. A young woman, unable to leave him, floating pretty and pale at the edges of his vision. It's a dream come true, a wish granted.

Except for when she speaks. Except for when she touches him.

"You're a coward, Baudelaire," he spits, ready for a fight. Rust in his voice, proof of her damage.

"Oh, you're up early." Violet says, not bothering to look him over, eyes still out the window watching the city bustle. "It's hardly past noon."

"Look at me," he demands, pointing to his red-ringed throat. "Tried to choke me, did you?"

That catches her attention. Violet's gaze crawls over his body. Though he has plenty, he needs no reason to be furious when she looks him full in the face, eyes like empty houses. It is simply the fact that she exists, arresting in her beauty and impossibility, that gives Olaf enough reason. His hatred feels instinctual. As if it is deeper than his surroundings. Deeper than Beatrice and VFD. Deeper than her murder.

Sometimes Olaf thinks his hatred has little to do with any of it, and instead that it is in him, of him. That he was born to embody it the way others are born into nobility or desperation. That when he was forming in his mother (like a gem cut from rough and wild stone - ) certain quirks to his existence were inevitable. _You will be a cruel and cunning man. You will do anything necessary to survive. You will demand notability. You will hate Violet Baudelaire._

At the window, nearly translucent in the light, Violet shrugs."I tried."

In his fury, his mind sparks with venomous, irrational insults. _I'll kill you twice,_ he thinks, then scraps it. _Dig you up. Lay you out. I will bite the tongue from your corpse._

"You want to hurt me?" Olaf demands instead. "You want to kill me?"

She says nothing, only watches him. Those eyes on his skin, making him itch.

"Do it, then." He snaps, arms open wide, bruises on display in the afternoon sun. Although he would never admit it, he wants it. Wants his own blood in his hands if he cannot have hers.

Olaf takes the switchblade from his pocket, flips the blade into action with a splinter of sunlight, and tosses it towards her. It passes through Violet's foot and clatters heavily to the floor.

She does not even watch it fall, too busy staring at him with that calculated distance to her face. Measuring him up. Only then does she look like her mother and it makes his guts crawl. Violet says nothing, does nothing.

Olaf, eager to get a rise out of her, tries again. "You're real brave, Violet. Attacking a man in his sleep. Why not give it a try now? Go on, I'll give you a headstart. And my best blade."

"Says you!" Violet shouts immediately, a snarl to her lips. (He knew that would work. He still hears her sometimes when she isn't speaking, her memory bright and vivid enough to linger. " _You killed me in these pajamas!"_ ) "Says you! The man who killed _me_ in _my_ sleep, you're going to complain about some pinching - "

Over her voice, he does not hear the knock at the door.

"Yes!" Olaf shouts back, a grin so wide across his face it prickles the corners of his mouth. There's a low thrum of rage swelling in him, rising from the heels of his feet up and up and up, building in his throat like a precious song. "The man who killed you wants a fight! What are you going to do about it? Slaughter me like you want to, Violet, I _know_ you do, so pick up that blade and - "

Before he feels the displacement of air, he hears the wet crack of impact. Right past his head, smacking against the wall by the door. A spray of red coats the side of his face as he turns.

A box of wine rests smashed on the floor at his feet, bleeding out like fresh roadkill, like something he has just ground out beneath his heel. Its corners are crinkled from impact, and a large split at the bottom seam is still seeping.

Violet hovers on the other side of the living room. He sees the moment she realizes what she has done, and all the fury drains out of her into hesitant, aching glee.

"Did you see that?" She demands, though there's no way he could have missed it. "I… I _forced_ it. I did that."

Olaf doesn't know what to say. The rage in him has gone sour, feels small and inconsequential against Violet's rising power. The bruises at his throat ache as he swallows, rubs the back of his neck. A bitter uneasiness comes over him as he wonders how much stronger she will become. Olaf imagines Violet growing more and more corporeal over time - dense like a cloud of fumes, just as volatile and nauseating. Gaining sensation and memory. Finding her humanity exactly as she left it, waiting to welcome her home.

They stand on opposite ends of the apartment, staring in silence at the box of wine slowly staining the carpet.

The knocking comes again, measured and polite. From that alone, it is no one he knows.

"Shut up," Olaf hisses, though she hadn't been talking. He crosses the room quickly, peers through the grimey peephole.

Outside, his landlord stands in the yellowed hall light, hip cocked, a slip of paper clutched in her hand. Undoubtedly, she wishes to discuss his rent. Olaf cannot remember the last time he bothered to pay. Each day he would open his door and step onto a new notice, which he would kick away and promptly forget. He glances to the pile of notices on the floor, slowly staining red.

An idea comes to him. A chance for small, petty revenge.

Olaf dives for a shirt on the couch, wipes the side of his face, and slips it on quickly. It is dark and long-sleeved, perfect for hiding the stain of wine on his skin and his collection of bruises.

"Don't get jealous, Violet." He says, dumping an armful of newspapers and magazines atop the mess. The knocking comes again and before she can answer, Olaf swings open the door with a flourish, purring, "Good afternoon."

"Oh! Count Olaf," gasps the woman. She pats the rings of curls at her shoulders, flustered. "I was beginning to think you were out, but then I heard you shouting. _The man who killed you wants a fight_. Were you… rehearsing?"

"Yes. A brand new role." Olaf lies instantly. His landlord is younger than him, though not by much. She stands tall and skinny as a piece of butcher's twine and her skin is pink with recent sunburn, bringing color to a plain, forgettable face. She is attractive in an easy way. Like a blank slate, an empty canvas. Boring, yet rich with possibility. Her position as his landlord turns her to a glittering, tempting resource. He does not recall her name. "Would you like to come inside?"

As soon as she steps into the apartment (nose scrunched in distaste, a frown on her lips, gaze skittering across the mounds of trash - ) Violet is shouting warnings.

"Get out, get out!" she cries, swooping across the room. "He's a horrible man! An arsonist! A villain!"

Though they wait, no shock registers on the woman's face. Violet tries again, drawing closer, shouting, "Hey! Hello!"

The woman's eyes pass through Violet and around the apartment. Completely oblivious to the ghost of a murdered girl hovering at arm's reach, mouth full of warnings.

It's a strange realization. One that arrives with more questions than it answers. They gather like shadows in the back of Olaf's mind. _What does it mean that she cannot hear you, cannot see you? Why me? Why you? Are you real at all, Violet Baudelaire?_

It seems to hit Violet at the same time. She hovers before the woman mute and useless, one hand outstretched like she might try to touch her. She floats for a moment, suspended in shock. Then her eyes find Olaf's, already staring. The momentary terror he sees on her face is enough to send a delicious curl of arousal through his body. (Up and up and up, just like the rage.)

"Olaf, you - " Violet starts, voice high with fear like a child. Her mouth snaps shut with an ashamed turn of her head, a fierce rigidity to her jaw. She lowers her hand. Looks towards the open window.

 _You can still see me, right?_ She does not say it. He will force her later, if only to hear that needling dependency. His mind fractures into options, then. He could ignore her for days, face stone-cold and distant. Grumble about her absence as he undresses for the night or piles more trash onto the wine stain, dried the color of blood and berries.

Cruelty, that long-gone crutch, hits him like a shot of alcohol. Straightens his spine, brings a triumphant grin to his face.

"As you can see, I've taken absolute care of the place," Olaf says, turning his back to Violet and leading his landlord (anxious, uncomfortable, the yellow form crumpled in her hands - ) towards his bedroom.

"Yes, well," the woman blusters. She picks nervously at a spot of peeling skin on her arm and Olaf is so charged with his coming victory that he does not even grimace. "I wasn't dropping by today for an inspection. Actually, I have this form here I need you to sign about your rent. It's very late, you know, and if - "

"I'm sure we can settle this like _adults_ ," Olaf drawls, holding his bedroom door ajar like an offering.

His landlord freezes, eyes wide with shock. Anxious laughter rises in her throat like a stuttering tic.

"No!" Violet shouts, floating above the doorway like a curse. Her eyes are venomous, wired. "What are you _doing_? She doesn't - "

"I don't really think - " the landlord begins, but Olaf cuts her off, tightens his grip on her shoulder.

"Nonsense," He says, "Now let's get you - "

"Olaf," huffs the woman, a firm hand pushing against his chest.

"No!" Violet shouts, charging. "No!"

Olaf sees her reach out, arm pearly-white and translucent even in her pinstripe pajamas. Sees the moment they touch, Violet's hand on the woman's shoulder. Sees the moment they both pause, eyes wide and confused. Sees Violet disappear like a blink, like a roll of film run to its stuttering, instant end.

She disappears without noise, without comment. A shadow of a girl gone by the time he could pull in a new breath.

His landlord stumbles a few steps, head in her hands. Olaf glances her over, no ready comforts in his mouth. He thinks only of how he might get her to leave without mentioning his rent, or how he might coax her into staying and forgetting it then, too.

He stares at the woman as she breathes heavily, head bowed. Olaf steps away, thinking she might vomit. And, if she does, how he might stick her with a bill for having his entire apartment cleaned.

He is considering this, almost hoping for it, when his landlord suddenly straightens. Her hands roam her body in a striking, familiar ritual. Grabbing at her clothes as if she had never seen them. Fists gripping at her stomach.

His landlord tilts her chin, looks him in the eye. Although they have met only a handful of times, her expression is utterly inconsistent. Even in obvious despair, the muscles of her face have settled differently, her body held with such unfamiliarity, she seems completely alien to herself.

Even to Olaf, there is no mistaking that despair. He has seen it every day for the last handful of months. Even in sleep, Violet Baudelaire haunts his nightmares. Realization and dread make his stomach drop.

"Violet," he says, stepping closer. Her hands are on her face now, brushing over her cheeks, her nose, her forehead. Foreign landscape. Although she does not speak, she nods and keeps nodding. Her expression is a strange mixture of horror and elation.

Olaf acts on instinct, reaching out. Much like Violet must have done. Compelled. Curious. Even as he grasps her hand, he half expects it to pass straight through. Instead, it is warm and solid in his.

Violet gasps at the contact, loud, nearly theatrical. Olaf braces for the coming shout, for the harsh break of contact, yet it does not come. Instead, she grasps his hand with both of hers and brings it to her cheek.

"It's been - " she says through a heave of relief. Although the voice is not hers, the diction is Violet. The cadence to the words, the weight of them familiar as change in his pockets. The corners of her mouth flicker with a frown. Her eyes flutter as if suppressing tears. " _Months_. Since I've felt anything at all. Any touch. You're - I'm… real. I'm real."

Olaf is so stunned, he hardly knows what to say. Touch-starved as he is, he represses the swell of harsh comments ready behind his teeth (" _Last time I said I'd touch you, you wanted me dead. Now look at you, nearly crying for it."_ ).

He wants to keep touching her, this puppeteer. This not-quite-Violet-Baudelaire. He spreads his hand out flat against her cheek. Close enough to feel his clammy palms, his callouses. His fingertips brush the soft hair at her temples. Violet shivers, hands vice-like at his wrist. Her eyes on his face are the only foreign part of her. Never before has she looked at him like this, with such aching, human gratitude.

He wonders if he could have made her see him like this before. If he had slipped into her bed, easy as a dream, while her mind spun with fever.

"You're very real," Olaf says, soft and calm. As if he had expected this. As if he has absolute control. His other hand rises to her neck, thumb on the racing pulsepoint. Olaf leans forward until their hips touch, until they're balanced against one another. "Do you want me to keep touching you, Violet?"

Normally, he wouldn't ask. Would take anything that was not a _no_ as a _yes_. This time, he wants to hear Violet beg. Wants to hear his name on her false tongue. Pleading for his hands on her stolen body.

Although her grip on him is still strong, the smile leaves her face. Realization replaces the gratitude. She jerks away from him quickly, stumbling, unaccustomed to the nuances of her alien body.

A wide, sudden grin splits her face. She pats her pockets frantically, feeling for car keys, for a slip of cash in her back pocket. Gleeful, near manic laughter rises from her lips.

"I can - " Violet sputters, "I've got to - My family - "

"No," Olaf growls, catching on with sick, instant clarity. His body fills with jagged rage, bracing for a fight. No matter her newfound form, he can overpower her. Can hold her down. Even imagining her with her arms behind her back, plain face pressed into the wine stain, makes his hands feel empty. He wants to make her cry, if only to see the tears. "No."

Like a last resort, Violet's eyes go past him to the switchblade on the floor. They both sense the unspoken threat. The potential for blood, whoever gets it first.

Although he knows he doesn't need it to hurt her, Olaf lurches towards the weapon first. It's the possession that ruins him (his blade, _his_ , seeing it in her hands would be a humiliation deeper than he could say - ).

Violet bolts.

Even before the weapon is gathered from the floor, he knows he is too late.

She yanks open the door with wild, careless force. Does not look back.

"Violet," he spits through gritted teeth, scrambling to his feet, hardly hearing himself. "I'll find you. I _swear_ I'll find you and your wretched family. I will kill you _twice_ \- "

She passes through the doorway and promptly collapses into the hall.

The body of his landlord hits the far wall and slides heavily to the floor.

As translucent and blue as the first time he saw her, Violet floats before the open door. She wears the same pinstripe pajamas. Her eyes are dark and wounded as ever beneath her bangs. Her expression is still with shock for a single moment.

"No!" she shrieks, throwing herself against the doorway. As if obstructed by an invisible force, she does not pass through. "No, no! I've got to - I - "

Outside, his landlord is coming to. Groaning softly, she rises to her feet, rubbing at her forehead.

Olaf hurries to the door, passing a furious, shrieking Violet.

"Thank you for coming by to discuss this," he says to his landlord with his most polite, theatrical lilt.

She gazes at him in bleak confusion, shaking her head. "Count Olaf. Um. What were we discussing?"

"My rent, of course." Olaf says. Meanwhile, Violet beats at the space at his back like an animal, like devastation half-embodied. "You came by to apologize for misplacing it for the last several months. But don't worry, I know these things happen. I'm sure you'll find my checks exactly where you left them."

"Oh," says his landlord, frowning. "Of course. Thank you. I'll get right on that."

He shuts the door to her uncertain frowning. When he turns, he finds Violet at the window again, curled foetal, and weeping (regrettably tearless - ) into her knees. He sees the bow of her spine through her pajamas. The deep curves in the soles of her bare feet, tucked close. The way the sunlight passes through her unhindered like a shard of stained glass.

The switchblade still rests ready in his hand. With a sneer, Olaf folds it, tucks it into his pocket.

He glances at the pile of trash where the wine stain dries to Violet's trembling back, rubbing the aching bruises at his throat. With a lurch of disgust in his gut, he realizes that he will have to sleep with his blade beneath his pillow, if only to keep Violet from summoning the strength to spear it through his neck.

Furious and ashamed of himself, Olaf returns to his stain of a bedroom, meanwhile his own voice haunts him like a second spectre. _Do you want me to keep touching you, Violet?_

He would have. For as long as she allowed.

He makes himself sick.


	4. FOUR

FOUR

Three days pass.

Olaf busies himself with familiar rituals. In the daytime, he walks a well-worn route throughout the city, nicking mail off the stoops of enormous, grandiose homes, hoping for cash. (He always finds at least one birthday card beneath a bright envelope, some thick cardstock covered in glitter and scrawling, happy handwriting. He grabs the cash, crumples the well-wishes in his fist, and drops the useless remains to the streets. Always, his hands come away glimmering.)

Around sunset, he stops by his favorite liquor store, buying as much wine as he can with his findings, bottles of red gathered in his arms like bouquets of roses.

He shaves his face at night, flicking soap off his straight razor and up the mirror as he gestures, lost in far-off fantasies. Mumbles to himself as he drags his blade carefully up and over the ridge of his jaw, "Oh, me? Voted Most Talented and Handsome for yet another year? Well, well. You absolutely should have."

Olaf sleeps past noon. Pens pointless, uninspired scripts. Drinks until he cannot speak.

Violet sinks to catatonia.

She has taken to floating upside down in his kitchen, translucent as a cobweb. Legs crossed like a child, shirt tucked into her waistband so it does not droop. Her hair hangs long and black towards the floor like a drip of smeared ink. Her eyes, unblinking, stare outside and towards the glinting city skyline and its traffic far below. She does not speak, does not inflict her gaze (dark and lonely as a tomb) his way.

They do not interact, existing within the oblivion of their own company. Three days pass this way, and things are almost comfortable.

Until the letter comes.

Olaf stumbles into his apartment tipsy, cradling several bottles of wine close to his chest the way others might hold a newborn. In his haste to leave, he had forgotten to turn down his record player, though his trip was short enough that it still drones throughout the place, high-pitched and wailing.

He steps inside to a crash of orchestral noise, scanning the room for reliable constants.

The yellowed bulb still ticks at the center of the room and the air smells stale as ever - festering trash and rot in the walls. Violet floats in the kitchen like a thought in the mind, hair hanging long and tempting enough to make his hands itch.

(He knows that his touch will run her through, that he is no closer to feeling her than he is to understanding her appearance in the first place. Watching Violet turn her head to follow cars outside, hair swaying as if caught in a current, almost makes him forget this. Perhaps she would look at him if he tried. Or speak. She became real once before, he thinks. Almost. Not quite.)

It is only once he turns to twist the lock that he hears the crackle of paper, feeling it stick slightly against the urban grime at his heel. A small envelope has been slipped beneath his door, though not from his landlord. It is rosy, the color of a young girl, vicious pink. For a moment, he thinks it might be a birthday card he had stolen then misplaced in his stupor, but the moment passes as he reconsiders his day and who might be slipping him notes.

The answer comes to him instantly, though he does not feel any better for it.

In other circumstances, he would not expect danger.

Any letter from her might as well be a demand - for luxuries, for attention, for a simple acknowledgement of existence. ( _You're alive and seen_ , Olaf used to think anytime she would throw a fit or bare her teeth like a rabid little animal. So desperate for eyes on her. Transparent begging for attention of any kind at all. _Too alive and far too seen._ )

Although Carmelita was vicious, her presence never accompanied a real threat. Yet, even as he scrapes the letter from the underside of his shoe, Olaf can feel the insistence to it. There is a reason to her writing him, and no doubt it is no good.

Olaf dumps his armful of wine onto the couch and tucks his thumb beneath the sticky flap, tearing it inelegantly. Inside, there is a single note written on parchment in thick, square-tipped permanent marker. There's a chemical waft to the ink that he can smell even over the garbage, yet it is not so freshly penned to smear under his fingers.

 **BB IS AFTER YOU,** it reads. The handwriting unfamiliar yet unmistakable. **WATCH YOUR BACK.**

His mind disregards the initial reaction. Spasm of gut-deep fear, instantly suppressed.

Despite everything - Carmelita's spit and snarl and attitude - he does not doubt her.

 _(Father?_ He hears Violet calling into the stark void of his apartment, her throat brittle with afterlife. _Father?)_

For months he has had nightmares of Bertrand Baudelaire hunting him down, coming closer, trailing him the way smoke tracks a breeze. Now, it is as terrifying a reality as his daughter floating phantomwise across the room.

He wonders how long he has until Bertrand shows up at his door, all smiles and brutal confidence, so sure in his coming justice he cannot stifle his joy.

Olaf tucks the card back into the little pink envelope, now sporting a print from the filthy sole of his shoe. On his way to the kitchen, he grabs a bottle of wine, pops the cork, and drinks as much as he can manage in one go.

"Did anyone come in while I was gone?" He calls into the dark blot of the kitchen. All around Violet are stacks of garbage and mail. Piles of papers litter the countertops like fallen foliage, his long-abandoned plots and schemes faded by encroaching grime.

There's a yellow notepad on the floor, the blue lines warped with rain, the ink runny. He had written only one word at the top, scrawling, rabid: SCRIPT. He had left the window open one morning on his way out into the world. Partly to clear the air, which had grown so foul he could barely stand it, but mostly to taunt Violet. He opened the window as high as it could go. Left her hovering just in front of it. An invitation she was unable to take. She had said nothing, had barely moved, only a soft flick to her eyelashes as he left.

Rain had come.

Rain had run the ink from his pages and bled out the newspapers on the floor. When he returned home, Violet was hovering where he'd left her, rain blustering in through the vapor of her body, gusting in rapid streams through the kitchen and over the laminate, soaking through the carpet of his hall and into the front room.

Since then, he keeps the window closed.

Olaf enters the kitchen, swigs a mouthful of wine but does not swallow. Even when he steps in front of her, nose to nose, eye to eye, Violet is not broken from catatonia. He gives her a moment. Her eyes do not find his, do not hold any spark of awareness.

He spits out his mouthful of wine. Sprays it loud and powerful right into her face.

Though it passes through her easy as the rain had, the disrespect stirs her.

"Hey," Violet whines softly, wincing.

"Hey," Olaf mocks her, low and stark. Wine drips from his mouth like blood from a bitten tongue but he cannot find the care to smear it away. "Did anyone let themselves in while I was out?"

"What?" She asks, frowning, eyes on his neck, finally absent of bruises. "No. No one."

"You didn't hear anything? No knocking? No shrill brat outside shouting demands?"

"No," comes her voice, soft as snow. Gaze still avoiding his face, and this makes him irrationally angry. He wants to yank her hair. He wants her to watch him open the window, rising slow as a guillotine's blade.

She tips slowly, gradually turning until she is right side up, still sitting with her legs crossed and tucked close, her hands in her lap. She nods to the envelope. "What's that?"

"None of your business," he snaps, ignoring the lurch of dread in his gut. Unappeased, he demands once more, "No one. You're sure?"

"I'm sure."

Olaf hums. "Pardon me if I don't take the word of a ghost who's barely moved for three days. I doubt you'd notice if I lit this place on fire."

Only once he says it does he notice the inherent cruelty in his words. Although he doesn't regret them, he is still surprised. Destruction, fire, smoke - they are never far from him, seem to fog his mind as if all that ash had settled into his body and never cleared. He aches for it more than he realizes. A conscious desire subconsciously wild.

To his further surprise, Violet scoffs, a harsh scrape of sound. Cynical. "Oh, I'd notice that."

Olaf drains the rest of the bottle and drops it empty to the floor. It hits the linoleum with a heavy clatter and a deep roll as it slumps towards a pile of trash. Watching it feels personal, autobiographical.

He's getting maudlin again. Emotional. Terrified.

Still, he keeps drinking.

"Yes," Olaf murmurs, popping the cork on his second red. "Your track record proves that, doesn't it?"

The silence in the room is suddenly needling. His record has stopped. He turns to find Violet watching him, though she does not look as furious as he would expect.

"Were you expecting someone?" She asks very carefully. "Your landlord?"

He doesn't hesitate before telling her the truth, and only after he speaks does this feel like an oddity. "No."

"Okay," Violet says uselessly. "Have you heard from her? Does she remember… what I did?"

Olaf watches her, wringing her hands in the loose cloth of her pajamas, her eyes on only him. There's a need in her to keep talking, to hear her own voice in the wake of her possession then catatonia. He indulges her with an answer, if only to keep his own terror at bay.

"You're asking this _now_?" He demands, a sour, exasperated expression on his face. He realizes he's a little bitter for her previous silence. Snubbed. As if she had been ignoring him. Olaf wants to be everything to Violet. Wants her to perk up when he enters a room and hang on his every word. Wants her to ask him to touch her, even if she cannot feel it and he's left with only smoke in his hands. He gets lost on this spiral of thought, (Violet light as vapor, dark as char, smoke curling through his fingers as he brushes them over her cheek and the ends of her hair) and realizes Violet is still watching him, waiting for clarity. His drink is dizzying him. "It's been three days and you're asking this now?"

"Three days?" She asks, a hint of that previous scoff in her voice, as if she hopes he is tricking her.

"Yes. I said that already. Listen up, little sprite. You've been staring slack-jawed out that window for three whole days. How is that surprising?"

Violet hums softly, vaguely. Olaf drapes himself across the couch, wine bottles clinking harshly beneath his weight.

"I thought it had only been a few hours..."

"Wrong!" Olaf sneers, nasty and comical. He takes another long sip, his lips vague and numb. "You're like a little pet watching the cars go by. Waiting for me to come home."

"Hardly," Violet says, closer now. "You never leave for long."

Then, shortly after, her doubt creeps in. "Do you?"

He hums noncommittally. Pestering and taunting her makes him feel better, seems to give the coming doom some distance. He lets her sit in that silence for awhile, sipping at his wine before he intentionally changes the subject. "Well, now that you've found your tongue, why not entertain me? Tell me something, Violet."

She floats cautiously closer, hovering just above the armrest near his feet. "Like what?"

He watches her for a few seconds, considering what she might be able to tell him. "Tell me about your family."

"My family?" Shock and suspicion make her squint. "Why?"

"Feel free to return to silence," he offers with a shrug and a wave of his hand towards the kitchen. "I did enjoy the momentary peace."

She debates this, watches him warily. If he were to guess at the machinations of her mind, he might suppose she would consider their circumstances. It has been days since she heard her own voice for any significant stretch of time. Her body, as always, feels vague and unmoored (except for that instance, bright and quick as lightning, where she was alive again.) She has no one else to speak to. No one else to acknowledge her half-existence. It might as well be him. "I was the eldest child in my family. I had two younger siblings, Klaus and Sunny. They were - "

He stops listening at this point. Hears only the drone of her voice, steady and calm. He does not particularly want to hear about Beatrice and Bertrand and the happy life they made together, complete with a mansion and children and more money than they could spend.

"Violet," he says suddenly, voice softer than he wants. Olaf is not sure where he interrupts her or what she had been babbling about, only that the soothing wave of her voice stops, and that he loves the intimate feeling of her name in his mouth. "What was it like? Possessing her?"

Then, when she does not immediately answer, "How did you do it? Did you only have to touch her? Could you control it?"

"I didn't mean to do it," Violet answers eventually. When Olaf glances her way, he sees that she has settled as if sitting on the back of the sofa, her little socked feet mere inches from his. "I just knew I wanted to pull her away from you. To stop it. I didn't _feel_ touching her. There was no… sensation. One second I was reaching for her and the next second I was her."

"But darling," Olaf slurs, intentionally saccharine. "You touch me all the time. You never possess me then."

When he glances up, her dark eyes are on his neck, searching for the faded bruises of her strangulation attempts. His clothes hide the welts still lingering in his soft spots yet he feels her gaze crawl over him anyway.

"You're right," Violet murmurs. "I'm not sure what that means."

Their conversation lulls as they both process that. Olaf waits, half expecting Violet to spit something nasty at him to make up for her gentleness, " _Maybe I just can't stand the idea of crawling inside your wreck of a body."_

He waits and waits and it does not come.

Instead, she says, "You said you'd kill me twice."

"Yes."

"Do you want to kill me?"

The question summons a confusing churn of emotions. Unwilling to examine them, Olaf deflects. "Do _you_ want to kill _me_?"

"Sometimes. But then I'm afraid I might be all alone here and the next tenants wouldn't be able to see me." Violet's feet have crept closer. Her toes are tucked and disappearing into his heel and he can't feel a thing.

"You keep me around for the company," Olaf snorts. If he were in a different mood, a different kind of drunk, he might have giggled.

"Isn't that why you like having me around?" She has slipped onto the arm of the couch and tucked her knees close, wrapping her arms around them. It's the same position he had first seen her take, floating spectral and blue in the midday sun.

Olaf resists the urge to hiss like a scared, caught little boy - _I do not like you!_ "Eye candy is always welcome, Violet. That's why I invited my landlord in, after all. Are you really so ignorant when it comes to men?"

"That's not why you invited her in," Violet counters, though there's no spark to it. "You didn't want to sleep with her because you liked her, you wanted to sleep with her to get out of paying your rent."

"Such a clever little ghost," he coos through a wicked grin. "But I'm sorry to say, your fears may not be settled. I don't pay my rent and I don't plan to. It's only a matter of time before they kick me out and you're left here all alone. Or I may decide a change of scenery is in order. Go someplace else. Hatch a new scheme. Write a play to make me filthy rich."

"You want to skip town?" Violet asks and he frowns immediately, wondering at his tells. Her face rests on her folded arms. Curled in on herself, she looks young and small and frightened.

"Maybe someday," he replies breezily, ending it with a long gulp of wine, yet Violet is not fooled.

"What's in that letter?" Her voice is calm. It is clear she expects the momentary candor between them to carry, but Olaf refuses to allow it.

"I told you. None of your business." His reply is just as muted. A plan forms in his mind, annoyance replaced. He has something Violet wants and no way is he going to let that be wasted.

"Let's make a deal, little sprite. I will ask about your experience with possession. You will tell me only the absolute truth. And if I feel your answers are honest then I will let you see that slip of pretty pink paper you want so badly. How's that, darling?" Olaf rises, head spinning, until he's in a sitting position, lower back braced against the other arm of the couch.

"But you already asked me about it," Violet says, obviously confused and searching for the trick.

"Then you have nothing to lose. Deal?"

After several moments of consideration, Violet finally says, "Deal."

"What did it feel like possessing her? To be back in a body again?"

"Overwhelming," she finally settles on. "Right now I can't feel anything. Not the couch or the rain or the breeze. Your apartment smells foul and I didn't realize that at all until I was her. So many sensations hit me all at once. It was difficult. In retrospect, I can hardly believe I'd gone on _feeling_ so much day to day when I was alive." She's quiet for a moment, cheek still resting on her bent knees facing him, though her eyes are to the floor. "It was like I could feel every hair on my head. Every breath. Even the weight of my clothes felt so strange… And then there was you."

"What did it feel like when I touched you?" He asks, voice gone soft and low.

Violet's gaze has returned to his face. He wonders if she is expecting cruelty.

"It felt like relief. I wanted to just… melt. I felt so alive and so human."

"Did you feel like a woman?" Olaf asks, holding her eyes. "Would you let me touch you again?"

"Show me the letter," Violet demands.

Olaf tugs it from where he had wedged it against his hip and the couch. He holds it up so she can see. Tilts it towards her the way one might bait a dog. "Answer me."

When nothing comes, he demands, voice stern with frustration, "Next visitor, Violet. Next delivery person or landlord or peddler comes calling - _will you let me touch you?_ "

Violet lunges.

Olaf does not even flinch.

Her fingers flash through his, useless, meek with death.

Violet groans with frustration as she tumbles into his lap, then darts to her feet to float above him, staring him down.

"Tricky, tricky, Violet," Olaf teases through a clenched jaw. "At least you gave it a shot, huh? You poor thing."

"You weren't actually going to show it to me," she spits, and her voice is full of venom, though there is a humiliated hunch to her shoulders that gives her away.

"Oh, but I was!" Olaf grins, the genuine laughter spasming in his chest feeling wholly unfamiliar. "Anything to keep my little ghost wanting me. She wants to see my mail? Have at it. But you went and ruined that, didn't you?"

She is quiet so long he starts to doze.

Through the haze of coming sleep, she speaks so softly he barely hears her. "Do you want to kill me?"

 _Do you want to kiss me?_ He hears, but knows better.

"Yes," he says to both. "Yes."

Night comes.

Olaf falls asleep on the couch, dreaming of Violet's voice through a black void.


End file.
